Headline inflation falls to 6.61 per cent

New Delhi, Dec 26: The inflation for the week ended Dec 13 was 6.61 per cent as against last week's inflation of 6.84 per cent because of drop in prices of crude and manufactured products. A CNBC-TV18 poll had seen inflation for week ended Dec 13 at 6.59 per cent. Inflation for the week ended Oct 18 was revised to 10.82 per cent.

The government reduced factory the central value-added tax (CENVAT) on a wide range of manufactured items by 4 percentage points on Dec 7.

However, inflation for 'primary articles'—which has a weight of 22 per cent in the index and contains food articles—increased by 34 basis points to 12.15 per cent in the reported week, as compared to 11.81 per cent the previous week ended Dec 6, 2008.

Annual rate of inflation for 'food articles" increased by 27 basis points to 10.46 per cent in the week ended Dec 13. It was 2.33 per cent in the corresponding week year ago.

OneIndia News (With inputs from Agencies)